Nintendo Posts Huge Losses

Remember back a few years ago, when the Wii was the hit toy of the year and the joke about the Nintendo DS was that it prints money? Not so much any more. Nintendo continues to post huge losses. Nintendo posted a net loss of some 70.3 billion yen ($926 million) for the six months to September 30 2011. That's nearly a billion dollars in loss. I'm no math wizard, Nintendo revised its full-year net income down from a 20 billion yen profit to a 20 billion yen loss.

Although softer sales on its systems and software are certainly a factor in Nintendo's sagging profits, the main reason for the loss is thought to be the rising value of the yen itself, which damages profits that come from overseas.

For the last six months, Nintendo sold 8.13 million units of 3DS software, while the combined sales for its NDS hardware line (DSL, DSi, DSi XL) were 2.58 million units. Combined software units sold for NDS handhelds hit the 28.99 million mark.

The Wii shipped 3.35 million units for the period, and 36.45 million software units were sold for the system. For the real nitty-gritty breakdown of Nintendo, check out the financial slide below: